We're all on walkabout

Submitted by Michael S (United States), Dec 26, 2014 at 08:57

Hi, Waza.

It just occurred to me that there's a possibility that there's a common thread behind all these. I wonder what it might be.

You're being facetious. 9/11 was carried out by Arabs from overseas, by the way, not long-time US residents; so there was a difference there. There are plenty of examples of the other kind of Islamonut, too, as you've noted -- long-term residents who decide to sublimate their marriage problems by blowing people to kingdom come, etc., and sometimes (as with the Boston bombers) even fresh converts discovering a sick new "meaning" to life.

A common thread? Honestly, I have to say that the common thread is that they're all sickos. Radical Islam seems to attract sickos like flypaper attracts flies (or in Sydney, as the back of a sweaty businessman's white shirt attracts flies).

Ah, Sydney! I liked the red tile roofs and green estuaries from the air; and the little gardens in front of people's houses that bloomed year-round.

I remember a "street" along the railroad station in Marrickville. It was actually just a sidewalk, no roadway at all; but houses faced and opened unto it. I think they called it a "lane". There was a Beatles' song back then called "Penny Lane", and I used to fancy that was it. We didn't have that sort of thing where I grew up; it was something "Australian" to me.

Marrickville was largely a Greek neighborhood then; and an Italian fellow ran the milk bar across the street. If you wanted to see "fair dinkum" Aussies, you had to go to the Marrickville Hotel and down a schooner. At that, you'd better go to the public bar; because the saloon bar had a lot of us "New Australians" -- Pomes, Jocks, Yanks, Taffies, Patties and Kiwis. There was a fellow who wore his hair down to his buttocks, which was very unusual in the 1960s. I found out that he did that because of his religion -- Sikh, probably. We had a Trinidadian living with us, and I knew an Indian at work; but we were mostly European types. I don't remember any Muslims back then.

Things have changed, huh? They say you can't go back. They're right. I guess we're all on permanent walkabout. Then we die, and go home.

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